Sigma Chemical Company of
St. Louis and Aldrich Chemical Company of
Milwaukee were both American specialty chemical companies when they merged in August 1975. The company grew throughout the 1980s and 1990s, with significant expansion in facilities, acquisitions and diversification into new market sectors.
Early history • 1935 – Midwest Consultants was founded in
St Louis by brothers Aaron Fischer and Bernard Fischlowitz, who hired chemical engineer Daniel Broida. • 1946 – Sigma was formed from Midwest Consultants and manufactured just
adenosine triphosphate. They were the first to manufacture pure ATP. • 1972 – Sigma's IPO • 1951 – Aldrich founded in
Milwaukee by
Alfred Bader and Jack Eisendrath and manufactured just
1-methyl-3-nitro-1-nitrosoguanidine. • 1966 – Aldrich's IPO • 1972 – Subsidiary Aldrich-Boranes launched to manufacture hydroboration products • 1975 – Merger of Sigma Chemical and Aldrich Chemical to created Sigma-Aldrich. Their first year earned $43 million in sales. • 1999 – Sigma-Aldrich reaches $1 billion in sales • 2005 – Announced membership in
The RNAi Consortium • 2014 –
Merck KGaA announced that it would purchase Sigma-Aldrich for approx. $17 billion (€13.1 billion). • November 3, 2014 – Sigma-Aldrich filed a definitive proxy statement with the U.S.
Securities and Exchange Commission to hold a special investors meeting regarding approval for the sale to Merck KGaA.
Acquisitions 1970s • 1978 – Makor Chemicals
1980s • 1984 – Pathfinder • 1986 – Bio Yeda, Bristol Organics • 1989 – Fluka Chemie AG (Swiss company founded in the 1950s) purchased for $39 million.
1990s • 1993 – Supelco, Inc. acquired to enter the chromatography market • 1994 – LabKemi AB • 1997 – Research Biochemicals International, Riedel-de-Haen, Techcares Systems, Carbolabs, YA Kemia • 1998 – Genosys
2000s • 2000 – First Medical Inc., Amelung GmbH, ARK Scientific • 2001 – ISOTEC (produces stable isotopes used in basic research and medical diagnostics) • 2004 – Ultrafine (a supplier of contract manufacturing services for drug development), Tetrionics (a producer of high potency and cytotoxic active pharmaceutical ingredients) • 2005 – JRH Biosciences, an industrial supplier of cell culture products for the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries; Proligo Group, a global supplier of genomics research tools • 2006 – Beijing Superior Chemicals, Iropharm, Pharmorphix, Advanced Separation Technologies (manufacturer of products for
chiral chromatography) • 2007 – Epichem acquired to expand capabilities in materials sciences and semiconductor markets; Molecular Medicine BioServices acquired to provide large-scale viral manufacturing capabilities; announced alliance with Sangamo BioSciences to develop zinc finger-based laboratory research reagents • 2009 – ChemNavigator • 2010 – Cerilliant Corporation, ACE Animals • 2011 – Resource Technology Corp, Vetec Quimica Fina • 2012 – Research Organics Inc., BioReliance (a toxicology and veterinary diagnostics company); • 2015 – Combined with EMD Millipore to make MilliporeSigma. ==Key numbers==